Former Long Beach port company head improved ship safety

Former Jacobsen Pilot Service CEO and President Richard Jacobsen in 1985. , COURTESY OF THOMAS JACOBSEN

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Father and son Richard Jacobsen (left) and Thomas Jacobsen (right) on a pilot boat in 2000. Richard Jacobsen died Friday. , COURTESY OF THOMAS JACOBSEN

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The MCS Pena makes its way under Gerald Desmond Bridge in the Port of Long Beach on March 27. Pilots from Jacobsen Pilot Service sail ships in to their berths when they arrive in Long Beach. Former president and CEO Richard Jacobsen died Friday. , FILE PHOTO: JEFF GRITCHEN, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Former Jacobsen Pilot Service CEO and President Richard Jacobsen in 1985. , COURTESY OF THOMAS JACOBSEN

LONG BEACH – Richard Jacob Jacobsen, whose family business shepherds about 7,000 ships through the Port of Long Beach each year, set new safety standards in the ship piloting industry.

Jacobsen died at his Palos Verdes Peninsula home Friday from complications of living with Parkinson’s disease, which he had had since 2011, his family said. He was 82.

Jacobsen went into the ship piloting business because he was familiar with it growing up, said his son Thomas Jacobsen, president of Jacobsen Pilot Service. Richard Jacobsen’s father, Jacob, created the ship-piloting business at the Port of Long Beach in 1924.

Richard Jacobsen learned firsthand about his father’s business at an early age, his son said. As a ship pilot Jacob Jacobsen had to climb from a boat onto a much larger cargo ship before guiding it through the harbor.

Richard Jacobsen was born in San Pedro on Nov. 26, 1931. His parents were from Norway and came from a family of fishermen, his son said.

He graduated from California Maritime Academy in 1952 and served in the U.S. Navy, reaching the rank of lieutenant. After the Navy, Jacobsen worked on merchant ships, then worked as a port pilot for his father’s business in the mid 1950s. He became president of the company in 1960.

Jacobsen Pilot Service was known in 1949 for installing shoreside radar at the Port of Long Beach to improve the safety of moving vessels in different weather conditions, the company’s website says.

Manny Aschemeyer, a retired port shipping company captain and manager who worked with Jacobsen for decades, said Jacobsen ran the first pilot organization and station ever to use radar. Aschemeyer described him as “the father of safety on the harbor” for creating a safety plan that was formalized by the state in the 1990s.

Aschemeyer said Jacobsen’s professionalism and customer service were unbeatable, which was also proof of his solid character.

“He was respected, admired, appreciated and loved throughout the entire community,” Aschemeyer said. “He was just a character that meant so much to so many.”

Jacobsen served as the company’s president until 1998, then served as its CEO until he retired in 2006, his son said.

His son said the symptoms progressed gradually through the years, from hand tremors to declining muscle control that left him bedridden. Jacobsen was walking until a few weeks ago and never used a walker, his son said.

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